Awakening the Advocate: Matt Friedman on Fighting Modern Slavery and Building Corporate Action

In this episode, Tom Fox welcomes Matt Friedman, founder and CEO of The Mekong Club, to discuss his book “Awakening the Advocate,” which explains his career in the fight against human trafficking. Matt tells his journey through survivor/NGO stories, traces his personal journey from a shy child in Connecticut to 35 years of anti-slavery work across 35+ countries, and shows that ordinary people can become advocates. He assesses progress as limited relative to the scale of the problem (50 million in modern slavery; 110,000 helped; 6,000 convictions; $236B in profits vs. $400M, now $250M, to fight it), arguing that awareness is the main gap. He outlines how companies, especially banks, can start internally via leadership briefings, policies, awareness, targeted training, red flags, procurement review, and baseline assessments, linking efforts to ESG, business value, and reputational/regulatory risk. Matt also discusses AI’s emerging role in detecting patterns across supply chains and transactions and emphasizes individual actions, pro bono support, and the importance of compliance work. Key highlights: Why He Wrote It Turning Awareness Into Action Building a Corporate Program AI and the Next Wave Hope and Practical Steps Rapid Fire Takeaways Resources: Matt Friedman on LinkedIn The Mekong Club Awakening the Advocate on Amazon.com Tom Fox Instagram Facebook YouTube Twitter LinkedIn For more information on the use of AI in compliance programs, Tom Fox’s new book, Upping Your Game, is available. You can purchase a copy of the book on Amazon.com. To learn about the intersection of Sherlock Holmes and the modern compliance professional, check out Tom’s latest book, The Game is Afoot-What Sherlock Holmes Teaches About Risk, Ethics and Investigations on Amazon.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices